I had one fan and I lost it. So I went out and bought a bag of 6 plain paper fans that will one day need to be redone because they are boring and the paper warped anyway. I also bought this fan with a kind of Spanish (if Spain were tacky) feel to it.

Spanish Senorita....with a lazy eye.

Then last week at Craigdarroch Castle I bought this little fan.

More of a Japanese look.

Neither fan is particularly accurate in material or even pattern for the 1850s. That will have to come at another time. I think the blue suits my coloring better. But, I think the red and yellow one will suit the dress better. I guess we better wait and see when it is done. And then decide which one I will use for Queen Victoria’s Birthday tea.

I had this lovely feather fan that I wanted to use with my 1895 dinner gown but it got lost in the vortex that is my home…likely my car keys with the command start is right next to it. They haven’t turned up and so I decided to go out and buy a new fan at least. (I wish a command start fob was as easy to replace as a fan.)

I didn’t find a feather fan but I found a package of paper fans (four in all). The paper got all warped so they don’t close well but I don’t like the paper any way. I’m thinking I will rip that paper off and put on some other paper. You know what would be awesome? Find a lovely fan at the Met site ( like the one below) and try to get it to print out full size and use that.

1840-70 fan. Metropolitan Museum

Anyway, with there being four in the package I can try my hand at a few and it wont be a loss if they bomb. It was only a couple of dollars for the whole package.

As a back up for my current project, I thought I should have a sure thing, so I invested a few more dollars and bought this one…

How did my sultry look turn into cross-eyes?

The fabric is a nasty polyester but the plastic part tries to be pretty. May be if I have success replacing the paper on the other fans I will get brave and try replacing the fabric on this one. In the mean time…if you don’t look too close, the colors are good.

My patterns didn’t come. Poopy. So, this weekend, the plan is to try on my new corset, hoops, shoes, and petticoat to see if I need to shorten the petticoat. I’m planning on digging out some facts about my great grand parents so I can do a post about the photo I used as inspiration for the dress I made when I was 16. I’m also toying with the idea of digging that dress out and getting some photos of it. Egads… big job. I might like to go to my favorite Victorian museum…I’ve been toying with volunteering there…if they’ll take someone who doesn’t speak French (English and French are our national languages so many places require that you speak both.) And finally, I have a half a plan to dismantle my first underbust corset and make it smaller. It is better made than the one I have that currently fits. The trouble is I can lace it grommet to grommet and by mearly sucking in I can spin it back to front. That is too loose. I’d like to pitch the one I am currently using. It was cheaply made and the bones are working their way through the fabric and attempting to disembowel me. A poorly made corset is just as uncomfortable as a poorly made bra!